


s a c r i f i c e (to protect you, i'd give my life)

by a_written_dream



Category: Captain America (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angry Steve Rogers, Angst, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Avenger Bucky Barnes, Break Up, Bucky Barnes Has Panic Attacks, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes's Trigger Words, Bucky Barnes-centric, Canon Compliant, Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Established Relationship, Gay Bucky Barnes, Hurt Steve Rogers, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Mission Fic, Not Really Character Death, Not sure?, POV Bucky Barnes, POV Third Person, POV Third Person Limited, Panic, Panic Attacks, Post-Canon, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Captain America: The First Avenger, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Suicide Mission, Protective Bucky Barnes, Rescue Missions, Sacrifice, Self-Sacrifice, Stucky break up, Trouble In Paradise, Verbal Abuse, bucky barnes is stupid and makes bad decision, but he does it with love, self-sacrificing bucky barnes, specifically from steve, steve is definitely tired of buckys shit, suicide mission
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-08
Updated: 2017-09-08
Packaged: 2018-12-25 02:42:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12026418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_written_dream/pseuds/a_written_dream
Summary: Bucky's done it before, and he will do it again. Even if he has to break Steve's heart a little in the process, it's better this way.At least that's what he tells himself.





	s a c r i f i c e (to protect you, i'd give my life)

**Author's Note:**

> A little background information for this universe: this occurs sometime after Civil War, when Bucky has been defrosted and all of the Avengers have cried it out together and are once again a team. Infinity war is not a thing. Also Steve and Bucky have been dating since the '30-40s.
> 
> There is a little Russian in there (like three words), and I do not speak even the slightest bit of Russian save for the things that Marvel has taught me through Bucky, so if anything is misspelt (it's not written in Cyrillic) please feel free to tell me!

Bucky feels numb. Completely and utterly numb.

Some part of him registers the _bing_ of the elevator as the doors slide open; he doesn’t move until FRIDAY pointedly informs him that he’s arrived at his floor. His eyes don’t leave the floor as he exits.

His mind is going a thousand miles an hour, buzzing with options, arguments, reasons, feelings.

He knows what he should do, of course; it’s two lives against one – two _good_ lives against.. well, a tarnished one.

Objectively, it’s not a difficult decision.

“Hey, Buck.”

Bucky’s gaze snaps up at the familiar voice that makes his chest tight with things he probably shouldn’t let himself feel at the moment. 

He hasn’t moved from the elevator doors, he notices. He takes a step forward and the doors slide closed behind him.

Looking at Steve – the person Bucky would do anything for; the person he would kill for. The person he would _live_ for – who is standing a few metres in front of him, dressed in soft pants and a sweater Bucky knows is taken from Bucky’s wardrobe, with his blond hair tousled, makes Bucky’s stomach clench and forces him to swallow around the lump in his throat.

Steve, with his big, blue eyes and too-big-for-his-own-good heart, who is Bucky’s reason for living, who’s Bucky’s everything, who’s the one thing Bucky doesn’t want to leave behind, who’s the only thing that makes Bucky’s decision even remotely difficult, is standing in their apartment looking all soft and warm, and Bucky doesn’t want to throw it all away, doesn’t want to give up the best thing that he’s been allowed to keep.

Bucky averts his gaze from Steve’s – he can’t look at him without feeling like he’s about to crumble – fighting the urge to cry, and mumbles a greeting. His tongue feels like sandpaper in his mouth.

He needs water, something to focus on other than the gut-curling realisation that he’s going to lose everything.

The kitchen feels miles away, and Steve’s soft footsteps echo deafeningly in Bucky’s ears.

“What’s up?” Steve asks; Bucky doesn’t have to turn around to know that the endearingly concerned frown is on his face, the one that pulls his brows together and curls his lips downwards.

“Nothing,” Bucky says, and almost cringes at how forced it sounds.

Steve is quiet for a while, his silence making Bucky’s skin prickle. Bucky silently begs him to say something, anything. He can’t stop his right hand from shaking.

“You wanna talk about it?” Steve asks tentatively, and Bucky wants to shudder at the memory that runs through his mind. It’s one of those he’s not sure if he’d rather have forgotten. Who would’ve thought that Bucky would find himself in this situation again?

_It’ll soften the blow,_ a part of him says, _it’ll make it easier on him._

Bucky doesn’t remember everything, and he doesn’t remember if this was true the last time, but he figures that losing someone for good is easier if said person has broken your heart.

He takes a deep breath, sets his shoulders, and tells himself he can’t possibly hate himself more than he already does. The thought of Steve hating him too makes something claw at his stomach.

“Not with you, I don’t,” Bucky mutters. He feels nauseas with how wrong the words feel in his mouth. The instinct to save and protect is stronger than the need to touch, to love, to bring happiness, though, so he doesn’t turn around when the silence turns suffocating. Instead he waits, gulping down a glass of water he’s afraid he won’t be able to keep down.

“Did I do something wrong?” Steve asks, and Bucky wants to cry.

_No, never. You could never do me wrong._

He doesn’t cry; he just huff, trying – in vain, he figures – to sound annoyed and not like he’s breaking.

Steve’s voice trembles as he speaks, “Buck?”

“Yes, Steve, as a matter of fact, you did,” Bucky snaps. He doesn’t turn to face Steve, cannot look at him, not when he’s lying through his teeth.

He’s clutching the glass in his hands so tightly that it cracks.

“All you ever do is remind me of who I used to be, who I’m not, what a fucking disappointment I am for being the way I am, and how I’ll never be good enough for you.”

_Low blow, Barnes, low blow._

Bucky knows where to push, of course, and he is going to push.

“Bucky, you know that’s not-“

Steve’s voice cracks, and Bucky thinks his heart might do the same.

“And then you go and lie about it, as if you’ve got some kind of duty,” Bucky spits. “Just be honest for once in your damn life and tell me I’m not good enough for you; it’ll make it easier for both of us,” he says through gritted teeth. He’s rubbing Steve’s insecurities right in his face, and he wonders how he – after almost a century worth of guilt and self-hatred – can hate himself more than he already did. He can’t imagine it getting worse than this though, can’t imagine the acid in his stomaching burning deeper and the darkness at the back of his mind being more consuming, more suffocating.

“Just leave me alone.”

“Why are you doing this?” Steve asks. The hurt lingers in his voice even as the defiance makes itself clear. Of course he figures it out, of course he sees straight through Bucky and his pathetic attempts to make things easier on Steve; what Bucky is saying barely makes any sense, with how good they have been lately.

“Because I’m sick and tired of trying to be someone I’m not, someone I’ll never be,” Bucky snaps. He puts his glass down, afraid it will shatter in his hand – he’s never as good of a shot if he’s got injured hands, and he won’t risk anyone else’s life just because he can’t control his emotions. “Because I’m sick and tired of _you._ ”

Steve doesn’t say anything, so Bucky lets out a bitter laugh.

“You know,” Bucky sneers. “I don’t think I've looked at you and felt happy since back in ’43, back before the draft, before the serum, before you and that damned war turned our lives to shit,” and isn’t that the lie of the century, “And before you go and ask: no, today is not a bad day. Today is just the day I realise I can’t fucking do this anymore.” He can’t keep his voice from shaking. He wants to laugh at himself; he’s worse at this now than he was seventy years ago.

“I’m not falling for this again, Bucky,” Steve says resolutely, and Bucky curses him and his unfaltering belief in Bucky and his ability to read Bucky like he’s an open book.

_Why do you have to make this so much more difficult than it has to be?_

“Don’t call me that,” is all Bucky manages to grit out.

“Fine,” Steve says, because of course he does. “But I’m not falling for this, not again.”

Bucky lets out a frustrated groan, all while finding it ironic how that’s probably the closest he’s going to get to letting his actual feelings show.

“There’s nothing to fucking fall for, Steve! It’s God’s honest truth.”

If Bucky had been religious, he might’ve felt bad for using His name to tell a lie, but he lost faith in a higher power a long time ago. The only thing he feels bad about is lying to the person who trusts and loves him the most.

“What are you going to do?” Steve asks, and sour triumph sparks in Bucky’s stomach at the hint of anger in Steve’s voice. Bucky lets it bubble out into a laughter that sounds insincere even to his own ears.

He turns around, tries to use whatever annoyance he can muster caused by Steve’s _damn stubbornness_ to keep a scowl on his face. 

His knees go weak at the look Steve is giving him. Bucky tries not to falter at the determined frown Steve’s brows are pulled into. It’s one of the many expressions which Bucky fell for, because it showed Steve stubbornness and perseverance, his promise to never give up.

Steve is trying to put on an act, pretending as if he doesn’t believe Bucky for a second, and Bucky loves him for that, but Steve is fragile – Bucky is taking advantage of that, and he should have known that nothing is impossible, because he hates himself more than ever when he thinks of that – and his eyes show every bit of hurt he’s feeling.

“I’m not going to do shit, except ask Tony for my own floor,” Bucky snaps with as much force as he can muster, which is impressively little. He doesn’t quite reach convincing, and he’s not really sure why he’s continuing – he doesn’t believe what he’s saying himself, and it’s pretty clear Steve isn’t about to, either – until he remembers Wanda and Clint and thinks of their blood on his hands. Until he thinks of Steve, bloodied and alive and _breaking_.

So Bucky carries on.

“I want this,” he motions between himself and Steve, “to end and I want you to leave me alone so I can live my miserable life in god damn peace,” he lies. He grits his teeth around it, feels the sour taste of it on his tongue, the heavy weight of it on his chest. He aches with it, aches with a need to cry, a need to beg Steve for forgiveness for the pain he’s already put him through and the pain he is going to put him through, a need to tell him he loves him, will always love him, unconditionally and eternally, aches with a need to tell him that is why Bucky is doing this.

_I need you to be hurt, doll. I need you to hate me. It’s for your own sake; I’m doing this because I love you. Please know that._

Bucky thinks of telling Steve that he hates him. He doesn’t; he can barely think the words without feeling nauseas.

Steve clenches his jaw, sets his shoulders, narrows his eyes at Bucky, but remains silent, and Bucky guesses that’s about as good as it’s going to get. 

He can almost say that he's happy with knowing that he won’t be here to see tomorrow; he doesn’t think he can live with the knowledge of the lies he has told, the way he has set out to hurt Steve – _Steve_ , his best friend and the love of his life and the best thing that’s ever happened to him, the only thing that ever really mattered. 

The decision to choose Wanda and Clint over himself was the right one, Bucky decides. With all the things he has done, things he has no way of redeeming himself from even if they weren’t his choice, if he can actively choose to do this to Steve, then he doesn’t deserve to choose himself over two good people who can bring more to the world – to Steve – than he can ever even dream of doing.

“Good,” Bucky says. “Now, let’s go get Wanda and Clint.”

Steve doesn’t argue, because how can he?

* * *

“ _Anyone got eyes on Barnes?_ ” Steve’s voice rings through Bucky’s earpiece, and Bucky isn’t quite sure how to feel about the fact that this is the first time Steve has acknowledged him since he went to gear up. That was five hours ago.

Bucky knows that it means that Steve is angry with him, which is what Bucky was aiming for in the first place, but that doesn’t stop knowing that the cold shoulder is the last thing he’s ever going to get from Steve, from stinging like a bitch.

It hurts more this time than it did when he was about to go to war.

Bucky figures he deserves it.

“Wow, Rogers. Got so little faith in me to think I’d run away?” Bucky retorts with faked offence.

 _Funny how you’d actually be right._ Bucky doesn’t find it funny.

“You think I need a babysitter?” he asks, his voice dripping with forced sarcastic distaste. “I ain’t the fist of Hydra anymore, you know. But, of course, can’t trust the Winter Soldier, an assassin, a murderer, the _villain_ , now can we?”

Bucky is aware that it’s a low blow, but he tells himself to not feel sorry for it; he was aiming low.

He pointedly ignores Tony’s remarks about ‘trouble in paradise’.

“ _Anyone got eyes on Barnes?_ ” Steve repeats through gritted teeth, and the part of Bucky that Bucky relies on to get this plan through is happy to know that he’s getting to Steve.

Most of him hurts with it.

“Natasha’s with me; chill,” Bucky says, glancing at Natasha who purses her lips.

“ _Natasha?_ ”

Natasha sighs as if physically discomforts her to have to confirm.

“Yes, I’m with him,” she states, and Bucky sends her a grateful smile that’s a little strained around the edges. He doesn’t think he could have gone through with his plan if he had been paired up with someone else; he’s thankful it’s her. She understands what Bucky is about to do better than most of the others would, understands the risks of telling the others, and she understands the value of two against the value of one. She’s more objective than many others, Bucky included, and so Bucky trusts her judgement. He’s happy to know that she trusts his.

Steve just huffs, and it sounds something like relief and annoyance all wrapped up in one.

A short while later Steve speaks through their coms once again, confirming that they have both Wanda and Clint safely with them and that they are heading out of the building.

Bucky takes this as his cue and gives Natasha a tight-lipped smile that she doesn’t return. Instead, she looks at him with a pain in her eyes that makes something in Bucky ache. He pulls her into a tight hug.

_It’s for the best._

She hugs him back just as tightly, because she knows it too.

“ _Thank you,_ ” Bucky whispers in Russian against her cheek, before backing away and giving her a lazy salute and a forced grin. He doesn’t stay to here if she has anything to say. He figures that she doesn’t; there’s not much to say.

He tries to ignore the wetness in both of their eyes.

“ _What did he say?_ ” Steve asks, and sometimes Bucky wishes Steve could’ve stayed hearing-impaired.

“I said: ‘let’s go’; don’t get your knickers in a twist, Rogers,” Bucky says as he quietens his steps and slows his heart. “Now shut up, someone might hear your babbling.”

“ _The building’s empty,_ ” Steve snaps, and Bucky lets out a quiet, unamused chuckle.

“As if it ever is,” he mutters darkly.

Steve doesn’t answer.

A calm surrounds Bucky as he walks through the large facility, a steady focus on the mission and the mission alone, a feeling that reminds him of blood and killing and _mission accomplished._

The feeling makes him feel sick.

He holds onto it.

Things are going well, surprisingly so, until Steve asks about Natasha and Bucky’s whereabouts and Natasha’s voice hitches just that little bit. Bucky curses in his head.

“ _Natasha._ ” The threatening tone in Steve’s voice almost takes Bucky aback. He’s never heard him use that tone against a teammate, nevertheless a friend. “ _Where is Bucky?_ ” 

Steve is a few provocations away from punching a wall. Bucky knows this because of the tremble in his voice and how he grits the words out.

Natasha has the decency to remain silent.

“ _You were_ in on it _!?_ ”

Steve is seething now, and Bucky barely contains a wince at how utterly betrayed he sounds.

“ _Where. is. he._ ” Steve demands when Natasha’s silence stretches on. 

“ _I don’t know,_ ” Natasha states truthfully, because while Bucky trusts her with his life, he didn’t think she needed to know the specifics. It’s better if no one knows but him; they’re less likely to find him that way.

“ _What do you mean you don’t know? You were with him!_ ” Steve snaps.

Bucky feels a little bad for dragging Natasha into all of this, but he also knows that she is fully capable to take care of herself – even against Steve’s rage.

“ _I mean exactly what I said, Rogers,_ ” Natasha states. She’s one of the few people Bucky has known that does and will not take Steve’s bullshit. Peggy was another. “ _He didn’t tell me where he was going._ ”

A few more turns, and then Bucky will be by the door, out of the facility, and closer to losing everything he’s come to love; not only Steve, but _everyone._

He tries not to think about it.

He wishes he could run – he doesn’t like the anticipation building in his bones and the thoughts running through his mind; he wants it over and done with – but he knows that the sound would echo through the com. He doesn’t want them to know that he’s still wearing his earpiece. He’s not sure why he _is_ ; maybe it’s because even if his teammates are fighting, even if Steve is furious, it’s reassuring to hear their voices. Maybe it reminds him of why he’s doing this in the first place, of what really matters.

“ _He didn’t tell you where he was going, and you_ let him _!?_ ” Steve spits. Bucky doesn’t think he's ever heard Steve this angry.

 _It’s good_ , Bucky tells himself, _it’ll soften the blow._

“ _He had good reasons_ ,” Natasha says. Her voice trembles, just the slightest, and Bucky hears what he can only assume is Steve’s fist burying itself into a concrete wall.

Bucky knows that what Natasha says is true: he has good reasons, and he's doing this for a good cause. The guilt gnaws at him anyway.

“ _Like hell he had good reasons,_ ” Steve all but roars, and Bucky almost wants to cower at the force of it.

For every second that passes, Bucky feels more and more like he’s making the right decision.

“ _It’s his choice, Steve,_ ” Natasha supplies. Her voice has gone soft.

It is Bucky’s choice, and he really hopes Steve can understand that as well as Natasha does one day.

“ _It’s a stupid ass choice and I’m god damn tired of letting him make stupid decisions,_ ” Steve says, a tremble in his voice that makes Bucky’s step falter. Steve doesn’t sound so angry anymore.

_The feeling’s mutual, pal._

“ _Bucky?_ ” Steve asks, his voice so quiet, so timid, that Bucky almost misses it. Steve sounds scared. No, scratch that; he sounds utterly terrified, and by god this isn’t at all what Bucky wants.

“ _Bucky, are you there?_ ”

Bucky’s breath hitches; he blinks away tears.

“ _Please don’t do this Bucky. I know exactly what you’re doing._ ” Steve’s voice trembles. “ _Bucky, I swear to God. You can’t do this to me. Not again._ ” 

The anger is back in full force, and Bucky is almost glad for it. 

“ _Please, Buck… You have to come back. Wherever you’re going, just.. come back. We can fix this, whatever it is we can fix it together, you just have to come back._ ” It’s gone again, replaced with a desperate cry.

Bucky’s stomach drops, plummets into a vast void. 

He clenches his fists and tries to ignore his heart breaking in his chest.

“ _Please, Bucky,_ ” Steve pleads, “ _don’t do this to me._ ”

Bucky thinks he crumbles at the absolute _devastation_ in Steve’s voice.

 _I’m sorry, Steve. But you know I’d do anything to protect you. I’d die, if it meant keeping you safe,_ Bucky thinks, smiling despite the pain. _It’s the end of the line, pal._ And how he wishes it weren’t so, how he wishes he could turn around. He can’t. He can’t, because he cares, because he has learnt how to love again.

So he keeps going and he keeps his mouth shut.

“ _Tony. Can you track his earpiece?_ ” Steve asks – as if somehow, despite Bucky’s silence, Steve knows that Bucky still wears it, knows that Bucky will hold on to whatever part of the people he has come to love, for as long as he can – and Bucky almost smiles a little. Trust his Stevie to keep level headed in all situations.

“ _On it,_ ” Tony says.

Bucky yanks the earpiece out of his ear and throws it down a conveniently placed chute.

* * *

The forest is denser than Bucky expected, and it takes him a good five minutes before he reaches the agreed clearing. Every passing minute makes his heart beat harder in his chest and makes him wish more that he could turn back.

He hears the dozen agents minutes before they appear through the trees, guns all cocked and aimed at his head.

“Soldat,” one of them says in accented Russian. Bucky doesn't bother telling the man that he’s known English for half a lifetime longer than he’s known Russian. He doesn’t bother saying anything else, either.

There are steps behind him and then the barrel of a gun is pressed against the back of his neck.

It took years after escaping Hydra before Bucky wanted to live, but eventually he got there. He doesn't fear death, but he doesn’t want it. So, he doesn’t feel fear, but he does feel remorse. He doesn’t let anything show.

But then the first man speaks up again, and the word he say – lousily pronounced as it is – sends a flash of panic through Bucky which he has to clench his teeth around to ignore. It won’t work – the words have no effect on him anymore – but Bucky doesn’t think the dread that bubbles cold in his stomach when he hears the words will ever quite disappear.

The words keep coming, and Bucky forces his breathing to calm, forces the emotions out of his system, clenches his hands into fists at his sides, closes his eyes, tries to stop the trembling, does his best to ignore the icy panic grasping at his lungs.

“Gruzovoy vagon.”

Bucky’s body goes still. His emotions, thoughts, _self_ slip out with one breath. He is not the Winter Soldier – can’t be, anymore – but he’s not quite sure he is Bucky Barnes, either.

His eyes are empty, calculating, his body calm, but ready to kill.

“Soldat?”

“ _Ready to comply._ ”

The man looks satisfied. 

The gun is removed from the back of Bucky’s neck.

“We’re good,” the man states. The rest of the guns are lowered. That they dismiss him as a threat so quickly surprises him. They are amateurs. They should not have access to the words at all.

“Blow it up.”

Bucky’s heart stops.

One of the men pulls a detonator from his pocket. The world moves in slow motions. Bucky can’t do anything but watch as the man pushes the button.

The ground shakes with the explosion, and Bucky shakes with anger, a seething rage that burns his bones.

There is only red.

Red blood, red death, red anger that bleeds into black panic. Panic, cold as ice, suffocating, drowning.

Bucky runs.

There is only the thudding of his heart in his chest, the whipping of the wind in his ear, the ever growing _panic_ -

He almost slams into Tony when the man lands in from of him.

Bucky skids to a stop, all but collapsing against Tony.

“Hey, hey. Calm down, Cyborg.”

Bucky tries to scramble into a standing positioning, frantic to get to his feet to move; he has to get to the building, Steve was in the building, Steve is in the building, he has to get to Steve-

“I’ve got him.”

“ _Steve,_ ” Bucky wheezes; he can’t breathe, he doesn’t have time to breathe, he doesn’t have time to stand here; he has to get to the building, he has to get Steve out, he has to make sure Steve is alright, Steve is _alive_ \- “Tony, let go!” He sobs; his entire body is tightly coiled nerves and adrenaline and fear and _panic_ and he trashes against Tony’s grip but his body isn’t listening and he can’t breathe and he _can’t get to Steve_ , “I have to- have to-“ Tony needs to let him go, needs to let him get to the building, needs to let him _get to Steve_ ; Bucky can’t stay here, can’t just stay here when Steve is in the building, when Steve could be hurt; he can’t; he needs to get to Steve, he needs to make sure he’s okay, he needs- he can’t be dead, he can’t be, he can’t- “Jesus christ, Barnes, calm down,” Bucky can’t focus, can’t focus on anything except _Steve, he needs to get to Steve_ because he doesn’t know if Steve is alright or if Steve is even alive and it’s killing him and he can’t breathe and his knees give up under him and he’s scrambling to get up, and he can’t breathe and he can’t see and everything is turning blurry, but Tony has a tight grip on his arm and Bucky wants to rip it out of its socket because he doesn’t need his arm he needs to get to Steve, he needs _Steve_ and he-

“Bucky!”

Bucky’s heart stops.

The world does the same.

Steve is there, running towards him, a little battered and a little bruised but alive and Steve is there and Steve is alright and _Steve is alive_ -

There’s a noise, something between a hysterical laugh and a cry, and some part of Bucky realises that the noise is coming from him.

He scrambles to his feet, stumbles, all but falls into Steve’s arms. Bucky’s hands are all over him; he can’t touch enough, can’t feel enough, needs to feel every part of Steve, needs to make sure Steve is okay and alive and well.

Bucky still can’t breathe, doesn’t remember how to, until Steve’s gentle hands are on his cheeks and there’s a whisper of, “I’m okay.”

Bucky’s first breath is a sob, a fast intake of air that does nothing to fill his lungs. He doesn’t care for air anymore, he needs to breathe Steve, needs to feel Steve’s breath in his lungs and Steve’s beating heart against his chest.

Bucky does the only thing that makes any sense to him: he kisses Steve. He kisses him forcefully, clutching desperately onto any part of him that he can reach, pressing their chests together, and holding on for their life.

He only feels a little guilty that Steve seems just as desperate for reassurance as he is.

When Bucky feels like he might be able to breathe again, he breaks the kiss, only to wrap his arms around Steve and press himself as close as physically possible. He doesn’t have it in him to care about the tears that stream down his cheeks at the sound of Steve’s steady, if a little rapid, heartbeat.

“They- they said they- they weren’t- they wouldn’t-“ Bucky hiccups. He needs to explain himself, needs to tell Steve he never wanted any of this to happen, needs Steve to know that Bucky just wanted Steve to be safe. “They said- said you’d- you all would- would be safe-“

He clenches his eyes shut as a fresh wave of panic washes over him, creeping up his spine and making his lunch constrict. He clings onto Steve like he’s afraid Steve will disappear. He is.

Steve hushes him, presses his lips against the side of Bucky’s head, clutches Bucky like he’s just as terrified as Bucky is.

“It’s okay, Bucky. We’re alright. We’re all alright,” he murmurs.

Bucky only grasps onto him tighter.

“I’m sorry, Steve,” Bucky whimpers. “I just- I just wanted- you to- to be- I just wanted you to be safe.”

Steve holds him so tightly it hurts, and he still isn’t close enough.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want you to get hurt and you did anyway. I’m sorry. I don’t hate you, I could never hate you, Steve; I love you, I love you so much, I’m so sorry-“ Bucky rambles, burying his face in Steve’s chest and pressing himself impossibly closer to the only real warmth he knows.

“I forgive you,” Steve is fast to say. “I love you, so much,” he whispers, running his hand through Bucky’s hair; Bucky shivers at the touch, but he barely notices it between the trembles.

“Please, _please_ , don’t ever do that again. I can’t-“ Steve chokes on his words, and Bucky places a kiss on his chest. “I can’t lose you again. If this ever- if- just- just talk to me, okay? We’ll figure something out, we- we've always been better as a team, just-“ he’s rambling and his breath hitches, so Bucky kisses him again, long and hard.

“I promise, I promise. I promise,” Bucky whispers against Steve’s lips. “I love you.”

Steve sobs as he whispers those same words back.

* * *

If Bucky keeps his fingers pressed against Steve’s wrist, just over his pulse, whenever Steve is within reach, for over a month after that, no one mentions it. And if Steve holds Bucky just a little tighter, not one mentions that either. 

**Author's Note:**

> This is my longest posted fic up to date, I think! Yay on me?
> 
> I started this thing seven months ago, and I've only finished it now? Can't believe I've worked on something for so long and actually finished it! 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed :)
> 
> Constructive criticism is _always_ welcome!


End file.
